The booths are dismantled and the halls cleared as another Semicon China comes to a close. It was a great show for us with many customer visits and in-depth discussions.

I’ve been coming to the show on and off for about five years and it is the sheer scale of the thing that never ceases to amaze me. With five halls each the size of several football pitches each packed full with stands from every type of supplier for the semiconductor industry, it is a colossal undertaking. Then with tens of thousands of people coming to the show it remains the place to do business.

Our Plasma Technology and Nano Analysis booth was full of activity with lots of visitors. We were kept busy with enquiries for tools and technical questions. My colleague Dr Ligang Deng is especially sought after for her in-depth knowledge of III-V material processing. I attended some of the off site conferences and it was extremely interesting to see that many of the presentations addressed subjects which we ourselves are targeting, GaN RF devices were much discussed for example. Plasma Technology has developed ALD deposition solutions and low damage GaN etch solutions just for this application.

So after three days of intense discussions all that remained was to have a well earned beer in the Kerry Hotel where intense discussions continued, but were more related to the rugby coming up over the weekend. Semicon China is a great place to meet new customers, deepen relationships with existing ones and maybe catch up with a few old friends as well.